Women, Family and Community Development – Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil

International Trade and Industry – Datuk Mustapa Mohamed

Higher Education – Datuk Seri Khaled Nordin

Information, Unity, Culture and Arts – Datuk Seri Dr Rais Yatim

Agriculture – Datuk Noh Omar

Works – Datuk Shaziman Abu Mansor

Domestic Trade – Datuk Ismail Sabri Yaakob

Sports – Datuk Ahmad Shabery Cheek

Foreign – Datuk Anifah Aman

Federal Territories – Datuk Raja Nong Chik Raja Zainal Abidin

Earlier Najib left Istana Terengganu at about 11.25am after a 30-min audience with King regarding the new Cabinet line-up expected to be announced 3pm Thursday.

Najib arrived at the palace 10.57am to submit the list to Tuanku Mizan and left about 30 minutes later without stopping to speak to the media representatives waiting outside the gate.

He is scheduled to announce the new cabinet lineup in Putrajaya at 3pm. The new ministers and deputy ministers will take their oath of office at Istana Negara at 9.30am Friday.

Umno sources earlier said that Najib had spent the last five days juggling names and positions to take into consideration the requests and views of various Barisan Nasional component parties.

It is speculated that there could be as many as seven new faces in the line-up – most of them from Umno, while the party itself may give up a few ministerial posts.

Up till Wednesday evening, several Barisan component leaders had met with Najib and Umno deputy president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin, who will be named Deputy Prime Minister Thursday.

The message Najib had for all of them was the same – that Umno was giving up quite a number of posts and that they should also be willing to make sacrifices.

Najib is expected to downsize his Cabinet, which now has 27 ministries and 31 ministers.

At present, Umno has 22 ministers, the MCA four, and the MIC, Upko, SUPP, PBB and PBS one each.

The new Cabinet is expected to have between 20 and 24 ministries, with no more than 27 ministers. Several ministries are expected to be merged.

Insiders said the ministries which could be merged are Tourism with Unity, Culture, Arts and Heritage; Education with Higher Education; Domestic Trade and Consumer Affairs with International Trade and Industry; and Agriculture and Agro-Based Industries with Plantation Industries and Commodities.

There have also been suggestions that the Federal Territories Ministry be merged with the Housing and Local Government portfolio.

Three ministries – Works; Energy, Water and Communications and Science, Technology and Innovation – could also be merged into two ministries.

This means that seven new ministries will be created from 13 merged ones.

As expected, Najib retained the powerful Finance Ministry portfolio while Umno deputy president Tan Sri Muhyiddin Yassin was made the deputy prime minister.

Muhyiddin, the former International Trade and Industry Minister, was also made Education Minister.

Umno Youth chief Khairy Jamaluddin was conspicuously left out of the cabinet while his contender for the Youth chief post, Datuk Mukhriz Mahathir, was made deputy international trade and industry minister.

Datuk Seri Shahrizat Abdul Jalil, who recently won the post of Umno Wanita chief, reprised her position as women, family and community development minister. Datuk Seri Dr Ng Yen Yen, who held that portfolio under the previous administration, was made tourism minister instead.

Two ministries have been done away with and their responsibilities absorbed into other ministries.

Najib, who was flanked by Muhyiddin and chief secretary to the government Tan Sri Mohd Sidek Hasan, also announced the formation of a new ministry.